Via Stephen, is this article from USA Today on the use of laptops in schools. It’s getting to the point where the the conservative majority will not be able to argue against students being connected with information technology. In a short time, using laptops will be more economical.

Back in the Dallas suburb of Forney, Superintendent Smith doesn’t know what he’ll do after the experiment with textbook-loaded laptops next year. It all depends on the price, he said.
"A child’s set of textbooks costs $350," Smith said. "If they can get these notebooks down to $500, it gets cost-effective in a hurry."

Panelists emphasized less the solitary aspects of the entrepreneurial life than the social ones. Forget genius, they said; what really counts most is building a strong network to turn to for help and advice, treating people with dignity, and serving your customers well.

Another interesting comment, from one of the panelists, especially for those in elearning:

Sectors that are in flux are often particularly rich in opportunities, he advised. “When there’s chaos, the existing relationships are in turmoil. In a slow-growth setting that’s been stable for five years, it’s hard to get a fresh idea to penetrate the existing structure.”

A recent report, on the state of the elearning industry in Quebec was commissioned by Alliance numeriQC and conducted by Amelioraction. The executive summary, in French only, is available for viewing and the entire report will be available for purchase soon.

Here is my quick translation and summarization of the executive summary.

The report’s authors describe the Quebec elearning industry as comprising about 60 companies, with a total of around 600 people. Most of these companies have fewer than 15 employees. During the past two years, many of these companies have seen 30 to 35% reductions in their annual earnings. These companies do not have the necessary resources to bring their products to market, especially since the elearning marketplace requires a complex “go to market” strategy.

Using Moore’s “chasm” model, the report states that Quebec companies have done a good job of attracting the early adopters, but are failing at convincing the more conservative buyers about the merits of elearning. In Quebec, most executives believe that classroom training yields better results than elearning. For this reason, the authors suggest that blended learning may be a better strategy for Quebec elearning companies. They also suggest that the elearning industry look at creating complete, or end-to-end solutions, in order to compete in an industry that is witnessing major mergers and acquisitions. They see fragmentation as the major obstacle to their industry’s growth.

The authors suggest that the industry look seriously into partnerships and collaborative models. They see Alliance numeriQC providing a provincial industry focus, and mention the national role of CeLEA for industry and CSTD for professional development.

Some of the 33 proposed actions include reinforcing the role of Alliance numeriQC; increasing the business competences of business leaders – especially in marketing, exporting and partnering; and identifying events to educate major potential clients about elearning. They recommend that the markets to be addressed should be, in order – Quebec, Canada, USA.

This is an interesting report, particularly for its similarities to other Canadian studies. There are some unique Quebec perspectives, and I hope that the spirit of co-operation will go far beyond the provincial borders. Obviously, when you add the figures from the elearning industries in BC, Ontario, Quebec and NB, we’re still only a few thousand people, and it’s a big world.

One of the issues that surfaced during the industry capacity initiative this Winter was a lack of high-level business skills in the region. We do not have enough experienced people, especially those with a tech start-up background. Dave Pollard, a fellow Canadian, has a couple of interesting articles focused on business skills. The first is on Avoiding the Landmines in the Entrepreneurial Business. Since most NB learning companies are private, Pollard’s advice is pertinent. I’ve been hit by some of these landmines – biting off too much; being too far ahead of the market and copycat businesses. I’m sure that many of us can relate to this post.

Pollard’s other article, The Caring Enterprise Coach offers a new service to small and medium sized companies. This service is not what you get from the Big 5 consulting companies; it’s focused on entrepreneurs:

The Caring Enterprise Coach is a collaborative enterprise of independent consultants, technologists, trainers and retired entrepreneurs. Our members are equal partners, each with unique and specialized skills essential to the delivery of our offerings. We have no hierarchy, no physical assets, no front or back office, no overhead, no bureaucracy, and no employees. Our assets are the shared intellectual assets of our members’ expertise, skills, experience, networks – and the leading edge tools and technologies that they have developed and contributed for our collective use. We bring agility, economy, efficiency, and, through our powerful independent networks, reach and depth, that no limited, hierarchical, traditionally-trained professional services firm can match.

These articles are worth a read, and may provide food for thought on how we can develop a community model to foster innovation and sustain our businesses.
Harold

Mark Lauer explains in May’s PerformanceXpress how human performance technology (HPT) is closely linked to Lean Manufacturing methodology. He shows the direct connections between Lean’s six elements, and the performance standards for HPT professionals.

We are all fellow travelers on the performance improvement road. We bring to the table a long dedication to human performance improvement and expertise that is not at conflict with theirs but is a perfect complement to it. We are all comrades in arms.

Whether it be Lean Manufacturing, Six Sigma or HPT; there are enough similarities in methodologies that we can easily work together. Another comparison, between HPT and Six Sigma, was recently published by Darlene Van Tiem, of the University of Michigan.

Six Sigma can benefit from HPT’s broader approaches incorporating theory and practice from a wider variety of fields. HPT, on the other hand, can benefit from Six Sigma’s commitment to decisions based on evidence and its involvement with senior management.

It’s not how we help to improve organizational performance that’s important, it’s about making lasting changes that are important to our clients. A multidisciplinary approach makes more sense, and I will continue to learn from other methodologies.

Digital Rights Management (DRM) and copyright are all in the news today. I’m not a lawyer, and haven’t studied the legal field, but it’s becoming obvious that we all have to understand the impact of DRM on our lives. It’s no longer enough to be legal, as the laws, and their digital applications, keep changing. From The Shifted Librarian:

So in summary, iTunes, MS Reader, and Palm Digital Media DRM: bad.
This is what really scares me about libraries getting into the digital files business, even outside of all the issues surrounded subscription-based access versus ownership. When terms change on a whim, upgrades take away existing rights, and files become locked and inaccessible, how is this going to affect how we circulate titles to our patrons? It’s not like libraries have any leverage in this situation since publishers and Congress are doing their best to eradicate fair use rights, including the right of first sale.

These are the same issues that keep coming up with academic clients who are looking at selling learning content. Do you need to control content? How are you going to control content? Are your partners controlling content? What are the effects of controlling content? How will this influence your business model?
I should have followed my mom’s advice and become a lawyer 😉

I had commented on the closing of TeleEd and its “After 5” newsletter on my other blog. The newsletter is now going to come under the umbrella of LearnNB, which I think is appropriate. I see LearnNB as the brand under which a number of independent ventures (public & private) can flourish. With this model, the closure of one part (e.g. TeleEd) would not require rebranding or renaming, as the LearnNB name can be more than the sum of the parts. This is a more networked, and non-hierarchical, model.

Our community of practice (CoP) will be developed under the LearnNB banner as well. My intention is to link this blog from the LearnNB site, as well as the other components to come – the collaborative work site and ELF’s Spoke network.

Here is another idea for the CoP. I think that we can use the After 5 newsletter as a discussion vehicle. For instance, a few of us could write a collaborative wiki on an area of interest. How about a wiki to collaboratively write a visit report on ASTD next month? (I won’t be there, but can write and edit from here). The wiki could be part of the newsletter, or we could use it as a development tool before “going to press”. How about 2 or 3 volunteers to blog ASTD? I can set up a blog for you on this site, or we can start one elsewhere. Let’s practice what we preach. If you don’t know how to use a wiki, then you can LEARN. I’m not an expert either.

Yesterday I found out about the Sasser Worm, the latest evil creature on the ‘Net. The first thing I did was open my Norton anti-virus software and click on "LiveUpdate". I then received one update. This morning I did the same and received another update. Each time I checked, an update was available, but at no time during the past 24 hours did Norton/Symantec "push" an update to me. Since I pay for this service, which most of us do, I must say that this is poor customer service. There are many people I know who only update when they receive a notice from their anti-virus service. I guess this is what happens when you have an oligopoly (or a "pigopoly", as the Register says) – bad service 🙁

75% of the work of every successful project is completed in the initial stage. In other words, every project has a balloon phase. And if it doesn’t happen at the beginning of the project, then you may get into some serious trouble.
The “understanding” phase needs to provide you with the framework for the project. It should be assembled with all major stakeholders. And its purpose is to define the problem so you can design the solution. The 4 bedroom house.
On 13 March, 1999, Habitat for Humanity in New Zealand made the Guinness Book of Records. They constructed a four-bedroom house from scratch. It took a mere 3 hours, 44 minutes and 59 seconds. (I’m sure there’s a reality TV show in there somewhere, but I don’t believe we need another one of those.) An incredible feat. The significant fact is that it took 14 months of planning to achieve.
The balloon was inflated at the correct end.

I often refer to the “first rule of project management”, which is – choose the right project. The balloon analogy is similar. If you don’t address all of the issues at the front end, then your project may balloon out of scope (and budget) in the middle, which is probably after you’ve negotiated the price. This is a great little article to remind us of many things that we probably already know about project management, but are worth reconfirming. The discussions are interesting, too.